Supply Chain

The American ATACMS long-range missiles supplied to Ukraine have proven to be one of the most transformative weapons Washington has provided Kyiv but it's not the only piece of Western technology that has made a difference in the fight against Russia.

Alan Brown described Jabil as one of the world’s largest companies that most people have never heard of. With more than a hundred factories across 30 countries, the company makes a variety of products ranging from consumer electronics to network equipment, and from medical products to automotive parts. Its customers include around 300 well-known global brands. “We offer them a broad range of services, from product innovation and design to delivery and after-sales service,” said Brown, Vice President of Supply Chain Transformation at Jabil.

In a significant turnaround after four decades of diminishing influence, the United Auto Workers (UAW) union recently struck groundbreaking labor deals with Detroit's Big Three automakers: Ford, General Motors (GM), and Stellantis. While this momentous agreement marks a win for workers, it also intensifies the pressures on traditional automakers as they navigate the transition from gasoline to electric vehicles.

Halloween lurks a few days away, but something scarier approaches: candy prices rising.

Keeping trick or treaters happy this Halloween is probably going to most more than you think. The cost of candy began to soar in April and prices have yet to come back to earth.

Here's some news about Halloween that's worth a few extra boos this year. The cost of candy is going up by a lot. Prices are up about 13% this year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor.

DC VELOCITY’s new podcast is designed to help you keep up with what’s happening in this fast-changing industry. Each week, the editors of DC VELOCITY discuss the latest news and developing trends we all need to know about to keep ahead of the competition. We also talk to industry experts and practitioners in the logistics field.

I should have known better. I work in supply chain. Even worse, I work for a company who makes solutions to help companies solve these kinds of problems, which I listen, speak and write about for a living! What was the problem? I ordered a table online without checking reviews sufficiently. If I had done due diligence, I’d have seen the warnings – the retailer had pretty pictures on their website, but their supply chain failed them, creating an eleven-month saga and unhappy customer. The combinatorial factors disrupting supply chains persist, but in this case the problem was completely preventable. The issue wasn’t poor planning – they had the inventory. The failure was in supply chain orchestration – connecting planning to execution.

Most food banks, homeless shelters and other social services nonprofits constantly face hard decisions about how to use their limited funds. Should they spend as much as possible on meeting the immediate needs of people who need help? How much of their budget is appropriate to spend on new equipment, skilled managers and everything else required for an organization to thrive and endure?

The spike is not yet showing up at the pump, but fears of a regional conflict are driving up key crude benchmarks.